The Conservative Party may appear united, but Europe could tear it apart
before the next general election

Margaret Thatcher, Edward Heath, John Major: all threeConservativeprime ministers tried to unite their party on Europe. But Adam Afriyie, an aspirant Tory leader himself, has triumphed where these three failed – as Jo Swinson, a Liberal Democrat minister, cruelly pointed out on Question Time last week. (Mr Afriyie, who was sitting next to her, looked none too pleased to be reminded of it.) Last week, almost every Conservative MP elected in 2010 signed a letter to Mr Afriyie, urging him to drop his support for a referendum on Britain’s EU membership before 2015.

Over the weekend, 10 senior MPs joined in with another missive. Tellingly, they included senior members of the Right-wing Cornerstone and ’92 Groups. If the Tory parliamentary party is a school, Afriyie is the boy who has been forced to run through a gauntlet of wet towels. No 10 will read his treatment as a sign that even on Europe, that most fissiparous of issues, the party is uniting behind the leadership. Is this right?

The best way of seeking an answer is to start with the electoral timetable. The Fixed Terms Parliament Act ensures that the next general election will take place in roughly 18 months’ time: were it not in place, the poll could well be only six months away. But by providing certainty about the date, the Act is having the paradoxical effect of making the contest longer.

And whether or not because of the appointment of Lynton Crosby as campaign manager, the Tory operation is sharper than it was a year ago. Ed Miliband’s lurch to the Left may or may not bring electoral benefits, but it has certainly given Conservative MPs a cause to oppose. The economy is recovering. Tory MPs in marginal seats don’t want dissenting noises off – from Mr Afriyie or anyone else. A leadership challenge is now unlikely, even if Ukip tops the polls in next year’s European elections.

The Coalition partners may quarrel among or between themselves over green taxes, immigration controls or child care, but none of these issues have the capacity to explode the Government. Only Europe has the elemental power to do so, and the Prime Minister has made two moves to defuse the issue. The first was to concede an In/Out referendum in 2017. At a stroke, this satisfied the group of influential Tories, such as Daniel Hannan and Douglas Carswell, who simply want Britain to leave the EU. The second was to promote a parliamentary Bill to write the 2017 referendum into law. It is this measure – proposed by James Wharton, a Conservative backbencher – that Mr Afriyie is seeking to amend. The Prime Minister had been left with little alternative but to back the proposal after Tory MPs amended the Queen’s Speech to regret the absence of a referendum Bill. This part of his charm offensive towards his party has paid off.

So far, so good for Mr Cameron. But the Tory leadership is vulnerable to over-confidence. The PM grossly under-estimated the opposition within his own Party to the same-sex marriage Bill. The disaster of the 2012 Budget took shape when the Chancellor flew off to America just before its introduction. And the Prime Minister, again, committed Britain to military action in Syria before squaring it with his own party. The defenestration of Mr Afriyie may only have set the scene for Groundhog Day.

The next Conservative manifesto will have to set out a plan for the repatriation of powers from the EU to Britain. The reason for that 2017 date, after all, is to give Mr Cameron the best part of two years for a renegotiation with other EU members. But what powers will he seek – in the event of being prime minister after the next election – to bring back to the UK? And when will he announce what they are?

There is no great mystery about Mr Cameron’s wish-list. It includes the repatriation of social and employment law, the protection of the City, greater powers for national parliaments and restrictions on foreigners claiming benefits. But this modest list, though too long for most of our EU partners, is also too short for many Tory MPs. They want Britain to be able to trade freely with other European countries – but share few powers with them, if any.

In short, much of the Conservative Party wants major treaty revision, our EU partners do not, and Angela Merkel’s hands may well be bound further if her party goes into coalition with Germany’s social democrats. The Prime Minister will thus try to delay bringing forward those manifesto proposals for as long as possible. Any row within his own party over them therefore looks likely to take place during the run-up to the next election, and not before it.

It may be that Mr Cameron’s referendum pledge has drawn the sting from the Europe issue, that the new Tory discipline will hold, and that the treatment of Mr Afriyie is a pointer to the future. But such an outcome would fly in the face of the history of the past 25 years. The Conservative campaign of 1997 was disrupted by Tory MPs declaring themselves opposed to British membership of the euro – in defiance of the then party line. I doubt whether Mr Cameron can avoid a repeat over the repatriation of powers when the next campaign comes.